If Evelyn Glennie gets her way, one day every orchestra will have a
stone xylophone. Martin Wainwright on a strange musical experiment
in YorkshireAs he chatted with friends last year under the
grand portico of Leeds university, Dr Kia Ng, a specialist in
music and computers, found himself turning a question over in his
mind. "I wonder how this building would sound?" he
thought.Professor Jane Francis, a geologist, gave him an answer.
The university's stones would ring, she said, if musicians could
find a way to play them. The exchange led to an experiment that
culminates today when percussionist Evelyn Glennie gives the
world's first demonstration of a stone xylophone. This takes
place at Brantwood, the former home of the great Victorian art
critic John Ruskin, in the Lake District.Comprising 48 chunks of
local rock, the 100kg instrument, which also boasts a raft of
computer technology, is now a contender for a place...